moonslav59

Didn't you say, just recently, we are not signing any FAs to a big contract? Okay, you were shocked, but would signing E Suarez and then dumping a salary like Bello of Sandoval really be all that shocking? I'm not saying the odds favor this, but how many times must we be shocked before thinking it's at least possible? We were shocked when we signed Bregman, last winter. Some were shocked we extended Devers, Crochet, Anthony, Campbell, Bello and Rafaela. Some were shocked we spent over $40M AAV on FA pitchers, last winter (21 Buehler, 10 Chapman, 9 Sandoval and 2 Wilson) IMO, I'd be fine with a trade for a big bat infielder like Paredes. I would not be shocked, in the least. All I hear down here in HOU is that cannot trade Walker, Altuve, Pena or Correa, so Paredes will be traded. I'll be shocked if he's not traded somewhere. The Astros need an OF'er badly and every team needs pitching. We have logjams in both areas, so the odds seem to favor we can match up.

I'm not sure the reason why the union doesn't push for more balance. I think they believe when a player gets $400M, the rest of the players will naturally get more. I think I read somewhere that the avg MLB salary is about $5M, but the median is like $1.4M. That means over half the players in the union make less than $1.5M. If they were a forceful voting block, which they could be if they flexed a unified position, some sort of changes could be made to bring the median closer to the mean. I've thrown a few quick ideas out there without much prior thought, but doubling the min wage would be a big plus. Min wage is NOT just for rookies: it's for all pre-arb players to benefit. I'm not sure how many that is, but it is a pretty big percentage. Many Arb 1 and 2 players make near or less than that $1.4M, so add them to the percentage and maybe they could force the change. Owners could probably absorb paying the lower half of players a lot more, but they won't do it without getting something back, of course. Let's just say the bottom 13 paid players on each team get this raise, that's about 360 players (13 x 30 teams=360.) If they all get a $500K raise that goes up to $1M by the end of the new CBA, we're talking $180M year one to $360M year ??? Hell, maybe the top 10-15 players make more than that by themselves! The theory makes too much sense to just discard out of hand, but making it happen would be more complicated, and it would have to involve limiting the top pay, somehow, or the players giving something else back.

TOR offered Tucker $350M/10. He'll have to get $110M/6 when this deal is done. I guess that's possible, but very risky.

I dont think MN says yes.

Yes, it would, Mayer is 54 and K is 41. We'd still need a 3Bman by trading Mayer.

BTV says his value is about $10M ($5M x 2). I think we might be lucky to find anyone to pay $8M of the $36M owed him ($4M x 2.) We might get someone to pay $3-4M x 2 for Hicks.

BTV accepts Early & Campbell for Keaschall. (Also Early+Arias) Of course I had to go nutty: Tolle, Campbell. Phillips, Wong & DHam for Keaschall & Jeffers Here is a lesser one: Phillips, Sandlin, Wong & DHam for Jeffers and Kody Clemens.

Of course the Twins would want more. I'm not sure Aria and Tolle gets it done. BTV accepts Tolle & Campbell.

They think we'll trade Bello to save some money, and they see Early and Tolle as the guys who move up. One will replace Gray and the other replaces Sandoval. They felt anyone we trade for, other than KMarte will be an imperfect fit. They mentioned Otto Lopez as someone with upside and Royce Lewis, despite the injuries and recent lower O numbers. Their dream guy is Luke Keaschall, but they think we'd need to give up Tolle or Early.

Maybe they just assume inflation and MLB salaries going up and up and...

The soxprospects.com podcast was a real downer. They blasted the loss of Bregman and questioned the signing of Suarez after using so manya ssets to get Gray & Oviedo. They even likened the Suarez signing to a trade, as they will lose their 2nd round pick (61st), 5th round pick (159th) & about $2M in Int'l bonus money in 2027. An ouch listen... https://news.soxprospects.com/2026/01/podcast-ep-398-alex-bregman-is-cub-but.html

Here is a list of the top OPS players from 2024-2025 that could possibly be FA or trade targets for the Sox and I'm throwing in some names of players not mentioned as trade targets: .913 KMarte .861 Seager .806 Suarez .784 Chisholm .769 Vientos .768 Paredes .766 Donovan .762 Bohn (Bichette is at .755 & Masa is at .742) .724 Hoerner Kinda slim pickins.

He's been under .700 two years in a row, and he's 25. He is not the guy we need for offense. Of course, adding Yoshida or Hicks, or both to a deal for him gets me listening, but we need some sort of offensive boost to the line-up, IMO.

I thought about that, too, and for a 2 month catcher rental that the manager decides would be the back-up.

Apparently, PHI offered Bichette $200M/7, but he took $126M/3. Tucker took $240M/4 from LAD. I'm pretty sure he got longer term offers from others, but the trend seems to be moving towards these type deals. That's some high AAVs there!

The vast majority of MLB players make min wage or arb wages. I used to bargain as a union rep, and the company often exploited the fact that the majority of members had seniority, so they had tiered pay schedules, but one the company took off and hired a ton of new workers, they flipped the script and offered the majority newer members jumps in tiers much earlier, and a contract was accepted that gave no raises to the senior most members. It happens. I can happen. Yes, something would have to "give" to get owners to significantly play lower tiered players more money and to establish floor levels for teams' spending budgets, and maybe that would be some sort of limiting higher level contracts of limiting the spending by top teams. Perhaps there are other "gives" the union give to get a more balanced reward system for the majority of their members most likely at the expense of the higher paid players.

Realmuto took $15M x 3.

How is it fair for the Sox to play on away TV and not get a penny?

The hold up on a trade w HOU is likely that we (as well as BTV) values our OF'er more than the value of Paredes, and we are either asking for another piece (RP'er?) or offering a non OF'er of lesser value. I think BTV undervalues Paredes, but I'm not sure by how much. BTV says it is a major overpay to offer Duran for Paredes, B King (RP) and Janek (decent C prospect.) It accepts Abreu or Rafaela for the same. It also accepts K Campbell for Paredes and one of the other two players mentioned.

My guess is Brez likes Gray and Oviedo more than most of us do, but Sandoval & Harrison are "Brez guys," too. I think someone will be traded. I'm thinking Crawford, but after hearing Merloni rave about him, I'm having second thoughts. Since the options for big bat infielders is dwindling, I'm moving away from the idea of trading Duran to someone who values him more as an OF'er than we do as a DH. We need his bat, and probably Abreu's, too. I'm not for trading Anthony, and Rafaela is one of my favorite players. Maybe E Suarez is still an option. We are about $18M under the third line, so maybe we need to free up $5-10M AAV, depending on how much we can defer with ES. Some have suggested Bello or Sandoval's $9M. Those would be easier to move than Yoshida ($18M x 2) or Hicks ($10M x 2), especially Bello, but it would be great if we could dump $18M AAV from Yoshida + Hicks by getting someone(s) to pay $10M/yr total for both. That would save us the $10M needed and keep the best of our depth. It would also open a slot on the 40 for Ranger.

Forget the "only." We pay him $20M more to pitch than to walk. I'm not saying he'll be back. My initial guess was 50-50, if it costs us $20M more, since we paid that for Buehler and essentially for Sandoval's one year, two (pretty close.) I am NOT saying I think we offer it to him.

Realmuto back to Phillies for $45M/3. DD was "in" on some big names, but settled for the "real thing."

I have to think DET was ready to get a comp pick and do without him, also. No, I have not heard his name mentioned. I also think if they were talking about trading Skubal, are they really looking at 2026 as their one year window? Maybe. Maybe not.

These big stars are taking super high AAV deals and not 6+ years.

Any sophomore slums should be, in theory, offset by age progression upticks from Duran, Rafaela, Abreu, Romy, DHam, Wong. It's not unrealistic to expect the same or more from Masa and Story. The only returning rookies are Anthony, Mayer, narvaez and Campbell. They should be outnumbered. That being said, I agree: we need a major boost to the offense to be a well-balanced team.